Rihanna and the boys noticed these groups quite early on. It wasn't difficult, as they were currently the only dots moving on the otherwise surreally silent map. They zoomed-in to focus.
"What is this? I definitely saw the dots.....but why can't I see anyone when I zoom-in?"
"No....they are there.....look closely. You'll notice a weird distortion in the shadows around the cluster of trees to the left. If I am not wrong, they are using some sort of a light reflecting tool. Probably an illusory curtain around them which is reflecting the light and all the images around them, allowing their real bodies to be hidden behind the illusion."
"Close.....but it's not an illusory curtain. They have been making special inscriptions on their clothes. This changes the materials of their clothes, creating a thin layer with high light reflection. This distortion is too stark and easily noticeable in the light."
"Ah!.....So that's why they are moving about in the obscurity of night!"
It wasn't clear if both the teams had come up with similar concepts, but none of the members of any of the prowling groups were visible on the screen. By the time dawn broke in the sky of Mystic Lands, many more teams had sent out small groups out in search for the people they needed to rescue.
These small groups were like small units of an army. The tracker groups were only in charge of locating and marking routes, so they were very tiny units, with not more than 5 or 6 members.
However, these were complete units, consisting of 12 to 15 members in each group. One Group Leader, 2 Trackers, Attackers and Defenders, 1 Alchemist'/Doctor, 1 Arrayist and 2 Forgers.
This was the second phase of this mission, where these groups were all scattered all over the lands, searching for the locations of their rescue targets. They did not reveal their locations voluntarily, and were mostly using various illusion spells or inscriptions or pills to hide their bodies and aura.
But fights would explode randomly I different parts of the map, whenever two or more different teams collided with each other. Eradicating groups from other teams was also part of these groups' mission, so they could bring down the number of competitors.
"Those groups have been prowling about in the same area for a very long time. Do you think they have already found out the location of the first target?"
"Hmmm.....I don't think the targets will be in such an open space. It is too easy to rescue someone from this place. There's no challenge."
"But maybe that's the idea...they know even the challengers will be over-thinking about the locations, so they placed the targets right under their nose, knowing none of them would ever think about this?!"
Rihanna and Ye Luo stared at Artreya who seemed overtly excited about his own idea. Rihanna tried to hold herself back, but finally couldn't stop her hands from swiping at the back of his head.
"Those Challengers are almost at the cusp of Sea of Consciousness. Do you really believe they cannot sense if the targets are right under their nose?!"
Artreya held his head as his excitement deflated. He opened his mouth to retort, but couldn't find any words and closed it once more.
"Look at the groups carefully. If you observe them for a while, you'll notice how they seem to be following a pattern. Or maybe a path?"
"It's a path loop. They have walked into an illusion."
But none of the other groups have reached this place as yet! Whoever could have drawn the illusion?"
"Hmmm....it couldn't have been the contracted beasts...the cultivators would have sensed them out."
The groups wandering about in the array must have sensed something wrong after moving in circles for some time. It didn't take them long to realise that they had somehow entered an illusion array. As they changed their direction of movement to search for the core of the array, they came across the other groups who were also stuck in the array. Immediately a volley of attacks exploded inside the array, as the members of different groups tried to take each other down.
And that was when they struck disaster. The simple illusion array suddenly bloomed into a full fledged attack array, and every attack hitting the barrier of the array was reflected back with manifold times the attacking power.
The groups scattered, trying to protect themselves from the random attacks coming from all directions, and a temporary truce had to be called forth. They could either fight inside the killer array and get annihilated, or search for the core and destroy it before the killer array destroyed them.
"Hmmm.....I would say at least one of the groups has a Space Master."
Rihanna frowned, turning towards Ye Luo.
"Only a Space User could have teleported an entire array without alerting the people."
"But telekinesis would also create energy waves in the area where the objects would be moving through."
"Yes.....but no one would be able to pick up on those waves if the objects have been moved prior to your reaching that area."
"Hmmm...so someone is tracking the movements of these groups and predicting their path, and then the space user is moving the array created by the Arrayist to a point further ahead of the path...wouldn't that be risky? What if the groups deviate from the path?"
"The Challengers are no joke. They are all experienced in various battle strategies. In fact some of them have already made quite a name in our country and even in other countries. They have led a lot of missions. Predicting movements might not be that difficult for them. Especially as the opponents are not that strong."
"That's true! Especially the ones from Whamei and Ye Clan.....they are quite renowned for their missions successes!"
"I thought Space users are pretty rare."
"They are.....the team which ended up with the space user has very strong luck."
"Well....luck is also a strength in such challenges."
Rihanna nodded, and was about to return back to the ongoing scene of the groups still trying to figure out the core of the array, when she felt an intense gaze on herself. Pondering for a bit, she directly turned towards the source of this gaze.
Su Maihiya.....just as she had thought.
Indeed, Su Maihiya had been keeping her eyes on Rihanna since the challenge began. The more she looked at the three, the more she couldn't understand what two cultivators might have in common with a commoner. Though she didn't know who the other boy was, she had found out more about Ye Luo in the past few days. So it was more confusing why this cold and detached man, who was not known for getting along with other cultivators, whether in the Clan or in the Sect, was being so friendly with Su Matsao!
This girl sure had some means of growing connections with unexpected people. And the more she felt that Su Matsao was growing out of her control, the more she felt annoyed. Now that she had found this girl once again, her prior plans could be put to use once more. But the presence of Ye Luo was becoming a hindrance!
Rihanna gave her an unconcerned glance, then turned back to the illusory screen. However, even as she concentrated on the scene in the screen, her mind was already conversing with Little Purple.
'Should we leave a spirit tracker on her? She is definitely cooking something in that little brain of hers.'
'No need. I already attached a bit of my energy inside her mind the last time we came across her near the library. We'll know what she is doing at all times. Anyway, she won't do anything inside the city. You'll need to be careful once you leave this place.'
'Hmmm. I will.'
Meanwhile, after the first series of attacks from the groups, the array had changed color, and a dark red glowing barrier appeared all around them. This stated that the illusory array had changed to a killer array. And now the attacks were being generated by the array itself. A number of members from the different teams had been injured, but they were yet to locate the array core.
"Groups of trees.....five groups of trees.....eight clumps of bushes....15 boulders...stones on the ground...frozen ice....the center of the area is flat and has nothing..... definitely the core is not at the center....."
Both Ye Luo and Artreya were used to her thinking out loud. Moreover they themselves were pulled into this thinking, as they started focusing on the area on their screens, trying to follow her thinking and search for the core.
Rihanna zoomed-in, going through each and every element within the array barrier with a mental scanner. A core was like that center which held all the other threads together. Once the core was destroyed, the entire web of threads would collapse. But the core could technically be anything. Even a stick or a leaf or stone could become a core. That depended on the ingenuity of the Arrayist.
"Stems.....branches.....leaves...rocks....stones..."
"Look!.....That bush.....look from the right side....there is a brown flower bud within the leaves, barely visible from the outside...that must be the core."
Rihanna frowned at Artreya's inference. She looked around and couldn't see any other buds on any of the other bushes. But why did she feel that this was not the core?
"Isn't that a Winter Hibernicus? They do bloom in freezing temperatures. That might just be the very first bud of the lot."
"You don't agree with me? But why?! I can't see anything else which could possibly be the core within that area."
Rihanna pouted her lips, her frown deepening.
"I don't know...Intuition! I just don't feel that is the correct answer."
"We'll know soon. Look, someone else too has come to same conclusion as Artreya."
Ye Luo spoke up the at the correct moment. Of course, from his experience he knew these two were about to start bickering, and he didn't want to bear the headache of people staring at them and passing snide comments. He had experienced too much of this back in the dimension. When these two went full on out with their different opinions, they seldom remembered where they were or who was around them!